Roma hold on to close gap on Juve

byDavidonFebruary 24, 2014

Roma clung on tight to a slender lead at relegation-threatened Bologna to edge a 1-0 victory which closed the gap on Italian Serie A leaders Juventus to six points.

Radja Nainggolan scored his first goal for the Giallorossi since moving from Cagliari in January, but Roma failed to put struggling Bologna to the sword and ended up retreating to resist a late backlash.

The Rossoblu, who have now failed to win at the Renato Dall’Ara in four attempts, besieged the visiting goal in the final stages and would have taken a point had Lazaros Christodoulopoulos scored from a diving header in the final minutes.

Roma will now hope Juve drop points in Sunday’s derby meeting with Torino while Bologna sit only two points above the drop zone and could well be sucked into it over the weekend.

It was an unorthodox Roma selection with Alessio Romagnoli preferred to Kevin Strootman in midfield and Rodrigo Taddei taking the place of regular right-back Maicon.

The Giallorossi duly struggled to keep their shape in the opening exchanges and Bologna twice went close to scoring through Rolando Bianchi, who was played onside by Leandro Castan, and Christodoulopoulos.

The Greece midfielder saw his free-kick take a wicked deflection off Mattia Destro but Morgan De Sanctis got gloves to the wildly spinning ball.